Hello and thank you for being a DL contributor. We are changing the login scheme for contributors for simpler login and to better support using multiple devices. Please click here to update your account with a username and password.

Hello. Some features on this site require registration. Please click here to register for free.

Hello and thank you for registering. Please complete the process by verifying your email address. If you can't find the email you can resend it here.

Hello. Some features on this site require a subscription. Please click here to get full access and no ads for $1.99 or less per month.

Inside the Billion Dollar Celebrity Impersonation Scam

From the article:

I learned from talking to West, the California prosecutor, that the Keanu Reeves scammer I was communicating with as Linda was likely a non-native English speaker using AI voice technology to impersonate Reeves. He is probably a victim himself, likely based in Southeast Asia. He may have found himself messaging a fake gray-haired lady in California who loves Keanu Reeves after responding to a seemingly legitimate job listing in a country like Thailand. When he went to the job interview, human traffickers would have kidnapped him, confiscated his passport, brought him across the border into Myanmar, Cambodia or Laos and imprisoned him in a compound, where he works 16-hour days reading from scripts written by experts in human psychology. “This is industrialized scam,” says West, who has created an international law enforcement coalition called Operation Shamrock to try to shut down these types of large-scale frauds. “It’s a growing industry, and it’s growing because it works.”

Offsite Link
by Anonymousreply 5July 9, 2025 5:52 PM

“Cuz for a long time I’ve never had anyone been real and truthful to me, it hurts my heart deep down Linda.”

Offsite Link
by Anonymousreply 1July 9, 2025 4:24 PM

How stupid are these people?

by Anonymousreply 2July 9, 2025 4:35 PM

I part where the woman who paid thousands to “Kevin Costner” is sitting in a lonely hotel room where they’re finally going to meet… and “he” texts her a photo of a crashed car on the highway saying he’s been in an accident. Cringe…

by Anonymousreply 3July 9, 2025 4:38 PM

And now she’s moved on to another scammer.

The hot/young/sexy babes scammers who target middle aged men, I mean that is kinda believable. Plenty of east European/Russian/Asian women do green card marriages here. But Hollywood actors and middle aged women is not REMOTELY believable.

by Anonymousreply 4July 9, 2025 5:17 PM

This is an illuminating and sad story.

Within minutes of the writer setting up a sad sack profile, she's contacted by "celebrities" who need bitcoin and gift cards. It's really hard for me to see how anyone could fall for this, but they do.

by Anonymousreply 5July 9, 2025 5:52 PM
Loading
Need more help? Click Here.

Yes indeed, we too use "cookies." Take a look at our privacy/terms or if you just want to see the damn site without all this bureaucratic nonsense, click ACCEPT. Otherwise, you'll just have to find some other site for your pointless bitchery needs.

×

Become a contributor - post when you want with no ads!